Thanks for this extra information, Ray. Looking again at the references to James, the only place where he is actually called a nephew is on the receipt for £10. Donna might have put that for our benefit, or perhaps it was the clerk who wrote up the court records, the clerk looking at the wording of the will. Perhaps only Elizabeth and John were children of the brother. That comma in the transcript is suspect in a legal document of that time.

Anyway, that is the interpretation that I am going to put on it. I am going create a new “spouse” for Robert, and transfer James from being a child of William to being a child of Robert and Anne Cowley. I am going to give him that middle name Edward, but where did you find him with that?

Have you tried searching for Robert Bruce’s London marriage certificates with Annie Hill and Bullen, and the death of Annie Bruce? I presume that Bullen was your grandmother.